‘Bankrupt' Ukraine cannot pay for needed reforms to join Europe

“Bankrupt” Ukraine has huge sovereign debt and needs reforms to make its association with Europe feasible, but no one is going to pay for it, Anna van Densky, political commentator from the EU Reporter magazine, told RT.

RT:With the ceasefire between Kiev and east
Ukrainian rebels holding and agreements now being implemented -
could this be the beginning of the end of the Ukrainian
conflict?

Anna van Densky: It could be but I`m very
cautious because now we have a declaration. Basically we have to
see the implementation. That is the serious thing. The Ukrainian
state is in profound crisis and President Poroshenko is largely a
president of Kiev. The problem is if he really has power to
implement this declaration, to implement this bill, and that we
will see in coming weeks. The Ukrainian state is so weak at the
moment and there are so many forces which are unleashed and they
are out of control. So we can`t really say if these agreements,
if this step towards peace will be respected on the ground.

RT:What exactly do you think the special
status granted Tuesday to east Ukrainian regions will mean in
reality, considering Kiev's refusal to acknowledge the Donetsk
and Lugansk regions as independent?

AD: I think there is a big problem. First of
all, there are more layers here; there is an international layer,
a layer of global geopolitical game because as we know the United
States is very eager to move its infrastructure and to engage
Ukraine into NATO.This is one level. The other level is the level
of the European Union. They have their own interest because they
are seeing Ukraine as a competitor of their agricultural
products. They are interested to conquer Ukrainian markets and to
trade with Russia directly. So there are also different interests
of political groups within Ukraine. As we knew before and as we
know now there’re political groups even like Christian Democrats
who were fighting with each other. The Ukrainian state resembles
somehow a medieval state with a lot of political clans that are
fighting with each other, and, of course, there is the terrible
monster of nationalism that was born at Maidan Square. So if we
look at all these different forces that are tearing up the
country it is very difficult to predict how really it will go,
how they will develop. If really there is this centralized force,
if there is a real state behind it to implement. Now I take it as
an intention. We are very far away from real peace because real
peace will be on the ground. And what we hear from there, they
are still fighting or they are still shelling. So that is not
ideal ceasefire we expected it to be.

RT:The parliaments of both the EU and
Ukraine have ratified an association agreement.Kiev says it will
come into force in 24 hours, but Brussels says not until late
2015.How do you read that?

AD: I think that here the crucial forces are of
course Europe because Europe is initiator of this policy and
Europe is the major source of this conflict. As we know President
Yanukovich lost power because he said exactly what the European
Union is saying now: that it is too early because whole sectors
of economy would suffer if this association agreement was
implemented immediately. What happens now basically is a very
frustrating because we see that President Yanukovich was actually
chased away for nothing because what he said was absolutely
right: “The country is not ready.” Nobody wants to see 45 million
Ukrainians - half the population- unemployed. Europe was very
adventurous in its policies. Now it is very clear that the
paradox of these policies that there was a huge ambition to show
that Europe is very much desirable and they wanted to give some
result to Europeans to show: “Look, Ukrainians are so eager to
become part of Europe.” But what is it in reality: Ukraine is a
state which is bankrupt, they have huge sovereign debt and nobody
is going to pay the reforms, because reform of the country - to
make this relationship with Europe feasible - is very far away.
We don’t know who can pay the reforms because still they should
serve their sovereign debt. There are a lot of problems, but I
think that still it is a happy day in the sense that we see that
country is moving in the right direction.

The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.